Social Media Image Sizes: A Complete Cheat Sheet for Every Platform

Updated on March 13, 2026

You spend an hour designing the perfect graphic, upload it to Instagram, and watch it get cropped into an unrecognizable mess. We've all been there. The frustrating reality is that every social platform has its own quirks — different aspect ratios, pixel requirements, even compression behavior. Getting these dimensions wrong means blurry images, awkward crops, or worse, important text disappearing behind a profile picture overlay.

This cheat sheet cuts through the confusion. Bookmark it, pin it, screenshot it — whatever you need. Here are the current recommended dimensions for every major platform, organized so you can find what you need in under 30 seconds.

Instagram

Instagram is the most dimension-sensitive platform out there. It compresses aggressively if you go too large, and crops mercilessly if your ratio is off.

  • Feed Square: 1080 × 1080 px (1:1 ratio) — the classic, still the safest default for grid consistency
  • Feed Portrait: 1080 × 1350 px (4:5 ratio) — takes up more vertical screen real estate, great for engagement
  • Feed Landscape: 1080 × 566 px (1.91:1 ratio) — works but gets letterboxed; use sparingly
  • Stories & Reels Cover: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16 ratio) — keep critical content in the center 1080 × 1420 px "safe zone" to avoid UI overlay
  • Carousel Posts: Same as feed — 1080 × 1080 px per slide is the smoothest experience
  • Profile Picture: 320 × 320 px (displayed as a circle, so center your subject)

Pro tip: Instagram recompresses anything above 1080px wide. There's no benefit to uploading a 4K image — it'll actually look slightly worse after their compression algorithm processes it.

Facebook

Facebook's complexity comes from the sheer number of placement types — personal profiles, Pages, Groups, ads, events. Here's what actually matters in 2024:

  • Feed Post (link/photo): 1200 × 630 px — the workhorse dimension that works across desktop and mobile
  • Square Post: 1080 × 1080 px — performs well in mobile feeds
  • Stories: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16 ratio)
  • Cover Photo (Page): 820 × 312 px on desktop / 640 × 360 px on mobile — design at 820 × 360 px to hit both safely
  • Profile Picture (Page): 170 × 170 px on desktop, 128 × 128 px on mobile — upload at minimum 180 × 180 px
  • Event Cover: 1920 × 1005 px
  • Group Cover Photo: 1640 × 856 px
  • Marketplace Listing: 1200 × 1200 px square

X (Twitter)

Twitter/X went through major UI overhauls, and some older dimension guides are now flat-out wrong. Here's what's current:

  • Feed Image (single): 1600 × 900 px (16:9) — appears largest in feed; great for infographics
  • Feed Image (2-image layout): 700 × 800 px each
  • Feed Image (3-image layout): Main image 700 × 800 px, two side images 1200 × 686 px each
  • Feed Image (4-image layout): 1200 × 686 px per image
  • Profile Picture: 400 × 400 px (displays as circle)
  • Header/Banner Image: 1500 × 500 px — this one gets heavily cropped on mobile; keep key content centered
  • Card Image (when sharing links): 800 × 418 px for landscape, 800 × 800 px for square

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a professional context, so quality matters more than on casual platforms. Pixelated images here reflect poorly on your brand.

  • Feed Post (image): 1200 × 627 px (landscape) or 1080 × 1080 px (square)
  • Document/Carousel Post: 1080 × 1080 px per page (square feels most natural here)
  • Stories: 1080 × 1920 px
  • Personal Profile Picture: 400 × 400 px (shown as circle)
  • Personal Banner: 1584 × 396 px
  • Company Logo: 300 × 300 px
  • Company Cover Image: 1128 × 191 px
  • Life Tab Background: 1128 × 376 px
  • Blog Post Link Thumbnail: 1200 × 627 px

YouTube

YouTube visuals are primarily about channel branding — and the thumbnail is arguably the most valuable real estate in digital marketing.

  • Video Thumbnail: 1280 × 720 px — minimum width 640 px, but always go to 1280. Under 2MB file size.
  • Channel Art/Banner: 2560 × 1440 px — the safe zone that appears on all devices is 1546 × 423 px center crop
  • Channel Profile Picture: 800 × 800 px (displays as a circle)
  • Community Post Image: 1080 × 1080 px
  • End Screen Elements: Keep all clickable elements within the 1280 × 720 px frame, avoiding the bottom 100px (where subtitles appear)

TikTok

TikTok is vertical-first, full-stop. Unlike Instagram which accommodates multiple ratios, TikTok is built around one format:

  • Video & Image Posts: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16) — anything else just gets letterboxed or cropped
  • Profile Picture: 200 × 200 px (shown as circle)
  • Photo Mode Carousel: 1080 × 1920 px per slide or 1080 × 1080 px square both work

Watch out: TikTok overlays UI elements at the bottom (like the caption and audio credit) and right side (like/comment buttons). Keep faces and key text in the upper-center third of the frame.

Pinterest

Pinterest is where vertical reigns supreme, and the platform actively favors taller images in its algorithm — they take up more feed space.

  • Standard Pin: 1000 × 1500 px (2:3 ratio) — sweet spot between visibility and performance
  • Long Pin: 1000 × 2100 px — maximum before Pinterest clips it; good for step-by-step infographics
  • Square Pin: 1000 × 1000 px — performs slightly weaker than vertical but fine for some content types
  • Story Pin: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16)
  • Profile Picture: 165 × 165 px
  • Board Cover: 222 × 150 px (minimal, design at 600 × 600 px and it'll display fine)

Snapchat

Snapchat lives and dies by the 9:16 vertical format. There's very little variation here:

  • Snap & Story: 1080 × 1920 px (9:16) — full bleed vertical
  • Spotlight: 1080 × 1920 px
  • Profile Icon: 320 × 320 px
  • Geofilter: 1080 × 2340 px canvas — keep design within the center 1080 × 1920 px area

Quick Reference: Ad Dimensions

Running paid campaigns? These are the ad formats that drive the most volume:

  • Facebook/Instagram Feed Ad: 1080 × 1080 px (square) or 1080 × 1350 px (portrait) — portrait ads actually show larger on mobile
  • Facebook/Instagram Stories Ad: 1080 × 1920 px — keep main message within center 1080 × 1420 px
  • LinkedIn Single Image Ad: 1200 × 627 px
  • LinkedIn Sponsored Content (square): 1200 × 1200 px
  • X Promoted Image: 1200 × 675 px
  • TikTok TopView/In-Feed Ad: 1080 × 1920 px
  • Pinterest Promoted Pin: 1000 × 1500 px
  • YouTube Display Ad (banner): 300 × 250 px, 728 × 90 px, or 300 × 600 px

General Rules That Apply Everywhere

  • Use PNG for graphics with text; JPEG for photos. PNG gives cleaner edges on text; JPEG handles photographs with smaller file sizes.
  • Always design at 2× your target size if you're exporting for print or high-DPI screens, then scale down.
  • Keep file sizes under 10MB across the board — most platforms have limits, and large files compress worse.
  • Design text-free edges. Almost every platform crops differently on mobile vs. desktop. Keep any critical text at least 150px from all edges.
  • Save a master template at the largest needed size and export at the specific platform requirements — don't design six separate files if you can help it.

Platforms update their specs without much fanfare — a cover photo that looked perfect last year might be displaying oddly today. Revisit this list any time you overhaul a brand presence or launch a new ad campaign. The investment of 10 minutes checking specs before a design sprint saves hours of rework after the fact.